Gift of Time

Are you ever dumb-founded as you stand amidst heaps of pretty paper pulled away

after we pried at the parcel that granted Today?!

With every breath we pull the tulle of moments from its gift

Heirs, as it were, to grace and mercy meting day-to-day

Where, if we see the value ere its seasoned seasons drift

Wonder would confound us with humble joy and we would pray

…and we would break our bread with head bowed, too awed to complain

Nor would we trample ribbons wrought with naught but simple joy

Then, wholly, holy we would tread this ephemeral main

Toward the Ultimate Undoing of what clocks deploy

Time’s quantum, untallied until its final gasp is spent

Arranges rigors too complex for mortal might alone

This test of quest and wrest of wonder-fashioned filament

Orders the footsteps of a man to bow before God’s throne

And beseech Gift of Time to teach him how to fully live

And reach to touch the Hand that shows him how to fully love

Lest he tears at time’s tissue to get, forgetting to give

For to whom much is given, much is also lent to prove

© Janet Martin